"INTERNATIONAL STUDIES at SAC - Arthur Jackson, Principal : Our curriculum will encourage students to be global minded as they explore how their world affects the bigger world in which we live.Students will participate in innovative and challenging hands-on experiences…. The curriculum will not be “textbook driven” but will focus on developing thinking and inquiring minds with opportunities for students to work in small groups and create projects. Students will frame all learning within a world perspective as they participate in in-depth studies of six units of inquiry.(To see the three versions of this description in three months time, the first one including the fact they were going to apply for International Baccalaureate Program as soon as possible, go to thislink: )

IB described by the (worldwide) Director of the IBO, George Walker, at Stockholm. (See entire article at this link: )

International Baccalaureate Director George Walker (United Nations provided funding to create the International Baccalaureate Organization, a non-government organization, in Geneva, Switzerland) says there are three parts to the IB curriculum, the compulsory part, the extra curriculum part; and in his own words, the "hidden curriculum, the informal but influential rules, beliefs and attitudes that determine the transmission of norms and values.

IBO Director Walker explains what global education is and what it is not. First, global education is not what the average US citizen would think it is. It is not international awareness of other nationalities and their views, culture, and values; and it is not just an academic education that prepares the student for international employment.

Instead Walker explains that a global student education is one that changes the belief system of the student so that the student no longer believes in patriotism and nationalism or the religion passed down by his culture. And it produces a citizen, in Walker's own words again, with the "skill of persuading [other] people to compromise or change their minds" as well, a citizen with "both the ability and the attitude that wants to shift another person’s position as well as their own."

IBO Director Walker says, "How do we reconcile a spirit of inquiry with a patriarchal culture that values received wisdom and rote learning? How can a secular curriculum be adopted in a country where religious faith, rather than empirical observation, defines the limits of truth? Is it possible to be a free-thinking individual, perhaps perceived as amoral, in a culture where the rules and rituals are unconditionally accepted and rigorously adhered to?" [Note the reason for doing away with rote learning and textbooks – it is received wisdom]

The eleventh and twelfth grade students have to take the IB tests prepared by the United Nations sponsored IB to get their diploma. These tests are not even graded in the United States. (Some people believe this is a made up story, but according to a school official at Hot Springs, these tests are sent to various countries in the world to be graded. Some go to Beijing, China, some to Uganda, some to some to Venezuela, some to New Zealand and Wales and various other countries. The school official said their postage in high school last year for sending these tests to other countries for grading was eight thousand dollars ($8,000.)

Now, a suburban Pittsburgh school district is abolishing IBO over questions of politics and cost. School board members in a Minnesota district call it anti-American and anti-Christian. In New Jersey, members of one school board argue it's a waste of money. One teacher objects to the program because of IBO's endorsement of the Earth Charter which calls for sustainability of the Earth through,, among other things, responsible reproduction and wealth distribution. (See this link for this article)

Several schools in Arkansas are now considering this program without knowing the philosophy behind it. We hope you will ask you legislators to study this program and rescind the law that allows IB courses to take the place of Advanced Placement courses. To get a list of all legislators' addresses, phone numbers, and emails, go to this link.

See next post on this blog for information about the one school district in Arkansas who has implemented IB districtwide and how their graduation rate fell to 56% and remediation rate went up to 67%.